Beginner's Guide to Running Computer Chess Tournaments

[Guenther Simon]

Hi all

Small mistake by Guenther, ETChess is freely available.

I'll add some more engines to the list when I have time.

Olivier

Yes thanks Olivier,

...must have been too tired from my first tennis match
this winter.

Regards,
Guenther

[Tony Thomas]

What's the point of listing an older program from a programer when a newer version is available?

available? )

It's just about the rules for listing.
For really private programs we neither know if the programmer
still has the source, nor when he touched it the last time.

Do you ever think that they would care to dig up the old source code for us? Mridul said that he no longer even have the code of Ceng, he had told Leo that he would be sending him a new version, but that was a while back.

So what? What do you think is the reason for this list at all?
Why do you think anyone of them will dig out the source
for 'us'? A list is just a list or what do you think
Either it has some rules or not...
I could have also listed private programs I know they
are clones. Actually I don't understand your problem?

Guenther

Using the same logic we would have to list Gromit as a private engine, 3.9.5 wasnt available to the public. Later versions were released as chessbase only versions(Anaconda, due to copyright reasons, it wasnt a rewrite), the current version seem to be UCI compliant(Info from Sedat), but no reason to list it on the private list, because recent versions are available(tho not as WB or UCI). We would also have to list monsoon, Cheeta, shinyknight etc..It would make the list rather pointless. I could also list private programs that are clones, but our idea is not to make a clone list, you saw that I told him to remove Eugen. If you think any of those engines on that list are clones, you can state your case and let Ron make the decision.

[Guenther Simon]

What's the point of listing an older program from a programer when a newer version is available?

available? )

It's just about the rules for listing.
For really private programs we neither know if the programmer
still has the source, nor when he touched it the last time.

Do you ever think that they would care to dig up the old source code for us? Mridul said that he no longer even have the code of Ceng, he had told Leo that he would be sending him a new version, but that was a while back.

So what? What do you think is the reason for this list at all?
Why do you think anyone of them will dig out the source
for 'us'? A list is just a list or what do you think
Either it has some rules or not...
I could have also listed private programs I know they
are clones. Actually I don't understand your problem?

Guenther

Using the same logic we would have to list Gromit as a private engine, 3.9.5 wasnt available to the public. Later versions were released as chessbase only versions(Anaconda, due to copyright reasons, it wasnt a rewrite), the current version seem to be UCI compliant(Info from Sedat), but no reason to list it on the private list, because recent versions are available(tho not as WB or UCI). We would also have to list monsoon, Cheeta, shinyknight etc..It would make the list rather pointless. I could also list private programs that are clones, but our idea is not to make a clone list, you saw that I told him to remove Eugen. If you think any of those engines on that list are clones, you can state your case and let Ron make the decision.

Just a note because I am not interested anymore to waste
too much time with babbling.
Anaconda has nothing to do with Gromit and it was a rewrite.
Current Anaconda versions are all UCI only and private.
The CB version of Anaconda is very old.

P.S. Who is 'we' mentioned several times?

Guenther

[Tony Thomas]

What's the point of listing an older program from a programer when a newer version is available?

available? )

It's just about the rules for listing.
For really private programs we neither know if the programmer
still has the source, nor when he touched it the last time.

Do you ever think that they would care to dig up the old source code for us? Mridul said that he no longer even have the code of Ceng, he had told Leo that he would be sending him a new version, but that was a while back.

So what? What do you think is the reason for this list at all?
Why do you think anyone of them will dig out the source
for 'us'? A list is just a list or what do you think
Either it has some rules or not...
I could have also listed private programs I know they
are clones. Actually I don't understand your problem?

Guenther

Using the same logic we would have to list Gromit as a private engine, 3.9.5 wasnt available to the public. Later versions were released as chessbase only versions(Anaconda, due to copyright reasons, it wasnt a rewrite), the current version seem to be UCI compliant(Info from Sedat), but no reason to list it on the private list, because recent versions are available(tho not as WB or UCI). We would also have to list monsoon, Cheeta, shinyknight etc..It would make the list rather pointless. I could also list private programs that are clones, but our idea is not to make a clone list, you saw that I told him to remove Eugen. If you think any of those engines on that list are clones, you can state your case and let Ron make the decision.

Just a note because I am not interested anymore to waste
too much time with babbling.
Anaconda has nothing to do with Gromit and it was a rewrite.
Current Anaconda versions are all UCI only and private.
The CB version of Anaconda is very old.

P.S. Who is 'we' mentioned several times?

Guenther

Here you can find some information about Anaconda Chess (former GromitChess) and about computerchess in general.
If your looking for Gromit from the "Wallace and Gromit" movies, please visit Aardman's web site.

Anaconda 2.0 is freely available as a Chessbase engine now!
Anaconda is available for Smartphone 2003, see here!
As of 24 February 2003 GromitChess has been renamed to Anaconda Chess.

The above is quoted directly from the gromit webpage..The word 'We' refer to people of winboard community, that includes me, you, Ron, Volker etc. The last available version of Anaconda is from 2005, that's not too old.

[Ron Murawski]

Thanks for the additional engines, Guenther. Do you have information as to author and country?

I'm not going to add The Baron because Richard said he would do delayed public releases. Did he change his mind?

Ron

Hi Ron,

Here is some more info:

Code: Select all

Jake      NL  Mark Netjes
ETChess   FR  Eric Triki
Rinko     IT  Marco Grella
CTD       NL  Richard Pijl
Imp       LT  Aivaras Juzvikas
Nullmover NL  Michael Langeveld
Stobor    US  Tom Kerrigan

What about the other (older)engines from Mridul,
'Borer' and 'Fencer' will you list them too?

Regards,
Guenther

Hi Guenther,

I want to make up a reasonable set of rules. So far it's this:
* Engine is not publicly available and is non-commercial
* Engine must have been active at least once in the past 5 years
* No clones, no listing by authors of previous clones
* Only one private engine per author (most recent engine usually, so for Mridul it is Ceng only)

Stobor is a tough one to call. Tom has TSCP available publicly. I think I must include it, but I'm not sure how to define that rule!

I don't know anything about Richard's CTD, but he already has The Baron.

Thanks for the additional information. The page has been updated again!

Ron

[Ron Murawski]

Using the same logic we would have to list Gromit as a private engine, 3.9.5 wasnt available to the public. Later versions were released as chessbase only versions(Anaconda, due to copyright reasons, it wasnt a rewrite), the current version seem to be UCI compliant(Info from Sedat)

Anaconda has nothing to do with Gromit and it was a rewrite.
Current Anaconda versions are all UCI only and private.
The CB version of Anaconda is very old.

Guenther

I looked at Frank Schneider's page and it says: "Anaconda 2.0 is freely available as a Chessbase engine now!"

Because of this statement I'm not going to list it as private. I see Gromit as public even though there were private versions of it. Once you let the genie out of the bottle, you can't put it back!

Ron

[Ron Murawski]

For Tony Thomas: Here's the current Private Engine List
http://computer-chess.org/pmwiki.php?n= ... EngineList
Did I miss any Tony?

Just ol' ZCT...

Is ZCT your engine Zack? I suspect so from the "Z" in the name. I'm adding it to my list with you as the author.

Ron

[Guenther Simon]

....



Hi Guenther,

I want to make up a reasonable set of rules. So far it's this:
* Engine is not publicly available and is non-commercial
* Engine must have been active at least once in the past 5 years
* No clones, no listing by authors of previous clones
* Only one private engine per author (most recent engine usually, so for Mridul it is Ceng only)

Stobor is a tough one to call. Tom has TSCP available publicly. I think I must include it, but I'm not sure how to define that rule!

I don't know anything about Richard's CTD, but he already has The Baron.

Thanks for the additional information. The page has been updated again!

Ron

The rules look fine to me and I don't see a problem for Stobor
with them, except the 5 years activity, which is difficult to prove.
The same with Ferret(if I needed to guess I would
even say Ferret is perhaps longer than 5 years inactive,
but I haven't checked server accounts right now).
Both Ferret and Stobor are simply the main program from both
authors which was always kept private, but both released
also a simple program just for teaching purposes.
(not necessarily with any similar code except WB interfacing)

BTW I forgot one:

Zzzzzz from Gijsbert Wiesenekker(NL)

Regards,
Guenther

[Ron Murawski]

....



Hi Guenther,

I want to make up a reasonable set of rules. So far it's this:
* Engine is not publicly available and is non-commercial
* Engine must have been active at least once in the past 5 years
* No clones, no listing by authors of previous clones
* Only one private engine per author (most recent engine usually, so for Mridul it is Ceng only)

Stobor is a tough one to call. Tom has TSCP available publicly. I think I must include it, but I'm not sure how to define that rule!

I don't know anything about Richard's CTD, but he already has The Baron.

Thanks for the additional information. The page has been updated again!

Ron

The rules look fine to me and I don't see a problem for Stobor
with them, except the 5 years activity, which is difficult to prove.
The same with Ferret(if I needed to guess I would
even say Ferret is perhaps longer than 5 years inactive,
but I haven't checked server accounts right now).
Both Ferret and Stobor are simply the main program from both
authors which was always kept private, but both released
also a simple program just for teaching purposes.
(not necessarily with any similar code except WB interfacing)

BTW I forgot one:

Zzzzzz from Gijsbert Wiesenekker(NL)

Regards,
Guenther

Thanks for the additional engine.

You are right about Ferret. According to here
http://www.chessgames.com/player/ferret_(computer).html
the last played game was in 2001. So I am removing it. Maybe I should have two lists: active and inactive?

I remember when I began this list that many of the engines seemed to be from a long time ago. I need to add a 'year' field for each engine.

Ron

[Zach Wegner]

For Tony Thomas: Here's the current Private Engine List
http://computer-chess.org/pmwiki.php?n= ... EngineList
Did I miss any Tony?

Just ol' ZCT...

Is ZCT your engine Zack? I suspect so from the "Z" in the name. I'm adding it to my list with you as the author.

Ron

Yup... Stands for Zach's Chess Test. Creative huh? I'll probably release it at some point, but that might be a while.

[Tony Thomas]

I contacted Tom and here is his reply..

No, unfortunately I have been busy with other projects and haven't looked at Stobor in a couple of years. But I'm still interested in chess programming and will certainly work on it sometime in the future.



Thanks for the interest,

Tom

[Guenther Simon]

I contacted Tom and here is his reply..

No, unfortunately I have been busy with other projects and haven't looked at Stobor in a couple of years. But I'm still interested in chess programming and will certainly work on it sometime in the future.



Thanks for the interest,

Tom

Thanks for the info!

Guenther

[Robert Allgeuer]

Two comments on the private engine list:

Colossus is freely available (http://www.colossus.demon.co.uk/chess/colossuschessuci.htm).

ChessWizard played in the Massy Tournament 2005, so it is not inactive according to the rules.

Robert

[Ron Murawski]

Thanks, Robert!